Otto Skorzeny: The Devil's Disciple with Author Stuart Smith. (2021)

on Scorzenny. He wrote this book titled Auto Skorzenny The Devil's Disciple, published twenty eighteen, a terrific book with forty two five star reviews. So it's very well received on Amazon. So people can go check that out. But Stuart's going to talk more about that. So Stuart Smith, are you.

became a consultant. And one day when I was working with another of my colleagues from the same magazine, earlier editor, we were putting stuff together and a submission came in and it was a strange submission. It mentioned this character called Otto Scott Senni, who I barely heard of, and I had a pretty good outline knowledge of what happened in the Second World War, who had apparently rescued Massolini. This man was a former, very well known creative director

in a UK advertising agency. And what he was trying to do, I suppose was it came across as slightly pretentious but interesting, was to say that there are different kinds of creative. You don't just have to be good at a partner or film. And in his sphere, Otto scots Sony was highly creative because he thought of the vertical axis, as he called it when rescuing Mussolini from imprisonment in the middle of Italy in nineteen forty three, some of which was true, and I thought, is this, well,

let's have a look at that. That's almost too good to be true. Was he such a so called creative genius and military terms? And when I looked at it, I discovered he had indeed participate in the expedition to release Bussolini from captivity, but that there was an awful lot of controversy about him. A lot of people, including those who served with him, said he had he was there, but someone else actually dreamed up the plan to rescue Mussolini.

And then I started looking at the rest of Otto Scotts in his career, and the one consistent thing about it is he's never without controversy. Everything he did attracted attention, some positive, not always there. And there are a number of events in his military career which I then touched on.

And then I discovered that he'd had rather good war ultimately because he'd escaped justice and we can go into what justice might have been later and lived the what you might call the life of Riley, which did include it. It did include a mansion house in Ireland eventually, but mostly it was in Spain between nineteen fifty and nineteen seventy five when he died in his bed, right.

and his mother also came from a military family. The Scotsendy name, in fact, comes from something like Skotsin, which is a place in Pomerania in Prussia. In fact, that center is back. So they had eventually settled in Austria, but they were established folk. He had an elder brother who was eight years older him, born in nineteen hundred, Alfred, who was an engineer, and his father was, like Scott Sney, fascinated about technology. But we'll come to that in a

little while. This sort of fairly idyllic middle class life was shattered very soon by the First World War. Austria Hungary soon well not soon, but it did collapse within three or four years. The Empire imploded on itself, and what was left after nineteen nineteen the Treaty of Sancho Man which is appended to the Treaty of Versai, imposed on the beaten Central Powers by the Allies, the Western Allies, was a very truncated country with lots of unemployed middle

class folk, industries that didn't work. Either the factories from on the Austrian side or the raw materials on the side. Would have been a free trade area was now anything but. And the Scott Seianney family together in my middle class Austrians at a time, found it very very hard In fact, as a quote somewhere in one of the books about Scott Senni, he said that he didn't taste butter until

about nineteen twenty three. It was that bad. And you know we've heard all the proverbial stories about wheelbarrows in the row in nineteen twenty three when the French army occupied the West Bank of Germany. Well, it's pretty much the same in Hungary. You know what would have bought a small house in nineteen thirteen, nineteen fourteen, would just about buy a postage stamp in nineteen twenty three.

involved in the whole Third Reich War effort? Right?

was drinking and sword play. And what I mean by sword play is there was a very established institution. It wasn't unusual in Austrian or German universities of the time of these what you might call very mannered combat jewel with sabers. They were called schlaga the sword, and the concept was called mensure. It originated in the post and Paneeronic War period and it was a sort of a ritual or rite of passage of certain not everyone in

university did it, but certain matcho young men. And the idea with this, and it's important for later on here, I think the idea of this was to show your unflinching bravery, because although the rest of your body was protected, your face wasn't. And almost anyone who was anyone with one of these swords had the scars to prove it. And also Scott say he was particularly well. He was insanely brave, as will become apparent in various episodes, but

he certainly showed it. At university he fought an unusual Most of most students might have fought I don't know three or four, any how long their nerve held, but he fought I think it was fourteen of these bouts over three years or so. And in nineteen twenty eight, after you've been at the Vienna Technical University for two years, he got unlucky and he was sliced down the left side of his face all the way to the jaw, which is how he got one of his nicknames among

the Americans. Anyway of scarface.

your enemy. And this was one small idea I think behind his decapitation missions later on when he was doing military service. So it was something that the rite of passage he has, but something that left a lasting impression on him.

number of paramilitaries. The most famous parliamentary organization in the nineteen twenties was the heimspheare the Home Force, really, that's what it meant, and these students were affiliated to that so in their spare time they could go out beating up gangs of communists. There was There was virtual civil war in Austria in nineteen twenty seven nineteen twenty eight, but a pattern began to develop and Scotseny moved towards

the Nazi Party. Was originally part of the Heims Fair, which yes was right wing, but it wasn't affiliated to the Nazis. In Germany in the early nineteen thirties, when the Heimsphair leader made a fatal political mistake, he decided to join government and he dropped the essential stipulation for a lot of these paramilitary students you like, of what was called Anschluss. That meant there was a very technical term which meant simply that Austria would be joined with Germany.

There's a great deal. I think this is quite an important point on why so many young Nazis felt justified in what they did in the early days. Anyway, there was a great deal of resentment after the Treaty of Versailles had imposed what was seen as a very skewed

settlement on Europe. I mean, it talked about self determination, meaning that you know, people's of one language and one culture should fit together, but it seemed to be skewed so that Germans never won aut That was why Austria was so small, Hungary was so small because they were

the beaten powers. The only way it became increasingly obvious that Austria had any kind of future was to join up with Germany again, and Adolf Hitler from certainly nineteen thirty onwards seen to be the future for a lot of these people. And then the Nazi party itself, where the Heinswheer had put aside Angelus as a policy and certainly the Austrian government didn't believe in it. The Nazi Party adhered to it very fiercely, but it was banned.

It was banned after essentially it assassinated Dolphus, the Austrian Chancellor, and so it was banned from nineteen thirty four onwards. Now, by that time, the nineteen thirty two Scott Sainy had joined the Nazi Party. He thought it was dynamic, it had lots of easy solutions that appealed to him, and in nineteen thirty four he joined the ss the elite Nazi organization. I should say something here about what the

SSS meant in those days. It was a kind of It was conceived by Himmler and Heydrich I Heydrich the in the late nineteen twenties early thirties as a sort of prietorian guard around Hitler and his Garlighters. But it was a lot more, and there was a sort of separate organization in Austria which it was essentially a middle

class intelligence police organization, intelligence gathering. So it would be very much smaller than say the typical well, it was certainly smaller Nazi Party membership and much much smaller than the Nazi Party storm Troopers, the Essay or brown Shirt. Proverbally, the SS were called the black Shirt, which was actually only true during the nineteen thirties. They changed the UNI from later, but at the time he's a distinction. That's

what happened. So Scott Sonny joined this elite organization and in it nearing the top, and he was top dog. After nineteen thirty six was someone called Ernst Carton Brunner, a real brute. I mean he was sort of six foot seven, even taller than Scott Seeney, even bigger, granite faced colossus and scars.

were involved in these student duels. But Scott Senny was certainly he didn't he liked to conceal this later because after all, Anst. Carlton Burner became the head of the Nazi security apparatus, the RSHA eventually from nineteen forty three onwards, and he was a war criminal, absolutely no doubt about that. And Scott Senne liked to see himself as a sort of clean a political soldier that he might differ about that. So this idea of this relationship with Colton Berner his

memoirs is very suppressed. It is mentioned. He doesn't completely show that away from it, but you don't get the impression they were very close.

he becomes a mechanic in a depot. Not many people have cars at that time, so it's a bit more prestigious than it is today perhaps, but nevertheless, he then graduates to a scaffolding a building company actually, but it specializes in scaffolding, and he's a sharp practitioner because he marries the boss's daughter, who's called Gretel Schreiber, and gets a share, eventually a major share in the business, and he continues in some way to be associated with it

until nineteen forty five, and which we say force measure took over.

So come the day when Hitler's threatening to invade Scott saying he is, if you like, on the inner ring, and he's part of the crowd, although he denies it in his books, he's part of the crowd outside the Chancellor's built a calling for him to resign, and you know, it's a very threatening experience, a sort of ring of He wasn't in uniform himself, I believe, but he was wearing a ski coat. But there are plenty of black shirts and brown shirts around, and he plays this cameo

role which points the way to the future. He's the chancellor at around about midnight only I think it was the thirteenth of March nineteen thirty eight. He finally buckles to the pressure and he resigns. Carlton Brunners in there because he's unofficially head of the SS and moment he's part of the investment of the chancellory. But there's a problem because the president, who's called Miklass, refuses to give in. And this could be very embarrassing for Hitler. You know,

it's a half cocked coup d'etar. He doesn't really want to have to actually use the tanks, so somebled outside, the armored vehicles and so on. He wants it to be a smooth, seemingly civilian affair where the the chancellor has just given up, the presidents given up when the

Hitler takes over. So what happens is that we're not quite sure who gave the order, but I think indirectly Colton Brunner himself told Scott SENNI because he happened to be around, and he happened to have access because as you said earlier, he was very much into motorsport, which was another Nazi sponsored business. He had access to a car and a few of his in a few of his mates raced to the residency of the of the

of the President and effectively burst in. And now the way he tells it, he was there as a mediator because he was worried that the guy would get murdered, which would not be a good look for Hitler or anyone else for that matter, with so here with the Nazi. But they wanted him to meet class, to leave peaceably.

But what actually happened was he went in there. Meeklas said later that actually he felt fear for his life, and so did his wife, because Scott Sending actually grabbed him as if to arrest him, and Miklas had a presidential guard read by the led by. Someone got left hand a bear sack who testified much the same thing that in fact Scott sayn he was much more aggressive than he portrayed himself. But nevertheless the thing ended peaceably, and Micholas could see the way things were going there

was no way out, so he gave in. And I think somewhere in there you know Scott sat had done it. He wasn't armed. He himself wasn't armed, though he'd had, you know, soldiers rifles pointed out him as he came up the stairs to arrest the president. The overall tape from it, as far as the leading Nazis were concerned, Carlton Brenner in particular, was he'd mission accomplished, He'd been a useful pair of hands, and that was stored for

later footnote in history. But you can begin to see the style, you know, insanely brave, dashes up the stairs, not armed. He's so self confident that he'll somehow sort the situation out, and he does. He does. I lost your sound.

like the first of many. I mean, Skorzeny's a remarkable he's almost like a Zelig or something where he's at pivotal events in World War two, like an observer like it, just a remarkable historical figure. So what happens after the antelists?

art Service. It is full of new, you know, leading edge technology, and most of those involved where they've only learned to fly, they're very young. They've only learned to fly the in the recent past. There usually because they're younger, more ardent Nazis than those in the army. We've been a better brunt of the war, of course. But he's

chucked out in effect. I mean, he's he must have known when he joined tried to join the loof Father, who he was thirty one, he was too old for it, and he was too big to fit in the cockpit of an Emmy one O nine. Which is this is he here? You know, going back, this goes back a bit to the Mensia business. Here's Scott Sayny, the sort of lone gladiator type, and he loved the idea of being able to get into aerial combat, but it just wasn't for him. So he did the next best thing.

He joined up As I said more or less. He went to serve more or less the day his daughter was born in Vultra in February nineteen forty. And you had to sort of start to You had to start in as a very strange organization. Actually the VAF in SS, it was the armed part of the party, but it had only just come into being, certainly as the VAF and SS that were there were armed units of the SS, and there were in fact two regiments before the war

broke out, and it has to be quickly expanded. So they were looking for a lot of people like Scott Sending, and a lot of professional people actually joined up. It expanded hugely fast. It wasn't particularly well disciplined at the

beginning because of the massive intake. There are a lot of people who came from the what was called the Ulga Minor SS, which was the General SS, which meant basically that they were snoop as they were policemen or or spies in terms of their training and usefulness the Nazis. There were also even concentration camp guards. You know, the organization was that desperate. But to get the numbers to get up to one hundred thousand or so, they'd only been.

I don't know what they were a couple of thousand or so fully armed, fully trained soldiers at that point, so it was a nascent organization, but it had lots from his point of view of potential, and it was very unorthodox in its approach to fighting. He joined a Vafen SS regiment which became known later on as dusk Reik. It was called the SS division right to begin with,

which was it eventually operated in Russia. But initially what he was was a technical officer, which was seen as a sort of in terms of the military hierarchy, cut below being a field commander, which I think he aspired to be but never actually became. He served mostly in tanked depots, sort of sorting out armored vehicles and refitting tanks for the armored SS divisions he served in France.

He did serve relatively actively well orbit in a rear echelong position in the war with Yugoslavia in April ninety forty one. Lasted all of eleven weeks in which he took a lot of prisoners, but more by luck than judgment, I think, and I think this probably gave him a

very mis the war in Yugoslavia was perfect blitzkery. Hitler was trying to as people only realized later, I was trying to protect his his western flank for the upcoming Operation Barbarossa, the planned invasion of the Soviet Union, despite the fa that Germany was in an alliance for the Soviet Union the time. So Scott Senne's next post is actually on the in the Reich Division and his riding point in the Spearhead was called Army Army Group Middle

or Center, which attacked after June nineteen forty one. It attacked Moscow and all went very well in the initial weeks, and they got to Minsk, and they got to Smolensk, and they seemed to be in fighting distance certainly well before Christmas, and then the weather began to change and the Russians began to change. And this is where he actually acquired his first medal, which was the Iron Cross.

Past too, he was cited for actually rescuing an armored vehicle in what was called the Yelnia bridgehead, which was it was the idea was that outside Smolensk, which was putting up a stiff resistance to the Russian Sorry, the German advanced. The Germans were going to outflank the Russians, Scott saying he got into this, into this bridgehead, and then things started to go disastrously wrong for the Germans.

It was partly the sort of very very heavy storms in November, the worst winter sunset and one hundred years it was only minus thirty at times. So the whole of the German army, the armored part of it, certainly was reduced to a crawl, the loofaff that couldn't take off, you know, fuel froze suddenly, the the it turned from a blitz creek to a war of attrition. At the same time, Stalin's greatest bluff of all probably he pulled eighty divisions from the Eastern Front, so there's no real

protection against the Japanese should they attack him. But he calculated right, and the Russians just proved far superior at winter war. The Germans were forced to pull back and it was absolutely horrific for people who were still well, just to take one instance, fighting in summer uniforms in

many cases. In this In this instance, Scott Saine is stuck in the Jani a bridgehead, was bombarded all around his regiment was not unusual for often SS regiments which stood their ground was absolutely pularized, huge casualties, and he himself he was afflicted by two things. One was a shrapnel into the back of his head, which finally saw him taken back to Berlin. But he also had a nasty attack of colitis. So actually he wasn't on the

Russian front for that long. He was withdrawn in January nineteen forty two, and that meant he was back into depots sorting out the next new range of Panzer tanks for buffer SS divisions March for Panza's tiger I's whatever, and he became very, very depressed. His father father died about that time, so nineteen forty two was not a good year for him, and he was seriously wondering about

what his future was going to be. And then he gets what you might call the phone call, the thing that's going to completely change his.

Germany was now even somewhere. Hitler and Himmler must have been beginning to appreciate that Germany was losing, I mean, after Stalingrad, after that Summer Corsk, the German army was incapable of taking the conventional army, the Panser army, the grand attack aircraft, you know, the backbone of Blitzkrieg, and

the Prussian military tradition of the time was failing. And Hitler had this meeting with Himmler in Baptor's Garden I think had the Berghoff in at the end of March nineteen forty three, in which it was the discussion point was really, well, it's time for us to turn to what the Germans called Kleiner Creek guerrilla warfare. We'll do anything we can to stop the advance of the Soviet army,

but what are we going to do? There was no I think the British had been outstanding at this kind of warfare because for the most of the last two and a half years or so they've been losing the war. But the Germans did admire some of the things they'd done. It had spectacularly successful commander raids like the one on

Sanna's air. And also there's something that came up a lot in Scott Seine's own assessment of the situation, something called Operation Flipper, which was a November nineteen forty one attack by British commandos which were usmately under Lord Mountbatten at the time, combined Operations Laycock as well. They tried. What they tried to do was very much as Scott Sainey type operation. They tried to kill Rommel in his

Benghazi headquarters. Romo of course led the Africa Corps at the time, so they launched a surprise attack in November nineteen forty one. Is amphibious attack because Rolls headquarters are quite near the coast in North Africa. It failed. It failed busily, I mean the leader of the operation, Lieutenant Colonel Keyes, was killed and the Germans managed to capture several of participants who were wearing German uniforms, which was against the rules of war at the time. Come back

to that as well. What they admired, when he admired was the fact that, you know, the British get up and go asymmetric warfare. It was obviously a pattern of something which could have succeeded. The fact of the matter was Romin wasn't there at the time. The intelligence is wrong.

the war. They deal with external security and internal security in the form of the r s HA, which, as I said, well, it was led by Ryan Hodd Hydrich until he got himself assassinated in Bohemia in nineteen forty two, and then by Caldenbrenner later on. They dealt with internal

security in all forms, most notoriously. Of course, carden Bern was in charge ultimately of the Gestapo, but there were other repressive forces available, so Himle's point was, well, we need to develop our own, and in fact there was. There was a small organization s S commando force of merely two or three hundred troopers actually mostly NCOs who've been turned into a unit which was run by something called Ausland SD, which translated means the SS Foreign intelligence

Service run by someone called Walter Schellenberg. And the idea was that resources would be put into this, the forces could be built up, and the SS could have its very own toy. But what the message that went out was, and the one that also has called Senny received, was that they were looking for a technical opera which he certainly was an engineer, to lead this new force which he knew nothing about, very good reason that no one

else did either. So he applied for the job and it was mediated by someone called han Hans Jutner, who was actually the sort of administrative head of the SS. He went for the interview and miraculously easily he got the job. The surprising thing about the job, which had the type called leader of S S Commanders, but it commanded, the the the the only he only acquired the rank of a captain, which in SS terms was called an S S Helpsta. He was only a captain, yet he

was leader of S commanders. What did this really mean? Well, he soon found out when he met Schellenberg. Schellenberg was really a spymaster. And the organization which Scott Senny was going to be leading was called something called a M T six s now. A MT was the name German bureaucracy. Here was the name of the organization. There was seven of these organizations. A MT means department basically or division.

Seven of these organizations under Carden Brunner's ultimate authority. NT six was the Foreign Service and MT S was, as Scott Sney thought, MT sabotage in other words, the commander unit. Actually the S stood for schooler. What what Shellenberg was doing was he was trying to recruit someone who'd straddle the two things. He'd help to recruit spies, but he'd also run a sort of part time command of outfit. And this was not what Scottsney wanted at all. He

wanted action. He was, you know, the the incarnate a Salt Force type. You know, the man of action. And he was so depressed by this that he talked to his friend Carl Raddle, whom he co opted as his adjutant, even though he's only one rank below him as a lieutenant s S lieutenant. He talked to me and said, well, you know this is this is really awful. I hate Shellenberg. He's such a sort of suave smoothie, and he's forcing me to run a spy network. I'm fitted for that

at all. Where all these commanders, there was a small command of forces I said. It had actually been put together from scratch by Schellenberg, but a year previously was commanded by a Dutch officer SS officer called Van Beerssen, and its original purpose was in fact an aborted campaign to counter invade Ireland when America came into the war. Was a real fear in Nazi Germany that neutral island, which of course was very important because it wasn't that neutral.

It was Nazi leaning, and they allowed Nazi U boats to take you know, they had access not to the ports, but they could look about outside. So the idea was that this force would actually help with a sort of kouder Man and in fact was attached to it had IRA contact, but it never happened. Operation Osprey I believe it was called. So this was the kernel force that Scott Seny was given. He was given no real brief

and what he was supposed to do. I mean, Carton Brunner personally wasn't remotely interested in command as what they could do. He was all about state repression. And he just simply said to Scott Soney when they had an interview, well, you know, just get on with it. And Scott Sandy said, well, get on with what exactly. I mean, Shalldom bog seems want a sky a spy school, and I'm not planning to do that. So as crude as this, Carton Brunner said, well,

you know, study the British. They seem to know what they're doing.

the Gulf of Persia. So the idea was that the Germans would attempt to ambush this rail this railway by supplying tribesmen in the south of what's now Iran. Scotts only had little to do with this. He acted as a recruitment agency and all that was a good idea. It was badly run. I mean, the ss were not the right they let's say they went hadn't got the right psychological frame of mind to mount such an operation. They didn't really know what they were doing. It looked

like everything was going into a dead end. And then the Mussolini event happens, and it's an expotential emergency for the Nazi state, the Third Reich, and for this reason Mussolini had been losing the war. The Allies had invaded successfully invaded Sicily, they were known to be about to

create a bridgehead It turned out to be Salerno. In mainland Italy, the Fascist Council, which nominally underpins Mussolini's absolute rule, managed to put through a vote of no confidence, effectively deposing him and then the King of basically victory Manual the Third was actually a very powerful figure behind the scenes stage La Couditar. He put someone called Marshal Badoglio Pietro Mondolio in charge, and he tried to sue for

peace with the Allies. Now this wasn't going to wash in itself, because back in early forty three, I think January forty three, there was an accord in Casablanca between Roosevelt and Churchill which effectively said that there is going to be no it is unconditional surrender, under no circumstances. Will Germany or any of its allies be able to

put down conditions if they surrender. But the King and Bodolio thought, well, look if we use Mussolini as a hostage, then maybe even get terms, and so they basically they kidnapped him and moved him around the country with the help of the Italian military Secret service SIM and he was guarded by carabinari and there were three or four staging posts for this. It was quite cleverly done, but

Hitler was absolutely determined to get him back. There was a sentimental surprising to hear anything said about Hitler's sentimentality, there was a sentimental to this. I mean, Mussolini had been his mentor in a way, the first Fascist leader,

first effective Fascist leader anyway. But mostly it was a strategic consideration because you know, the Italians, they hadn't exactly had a glorious record in the war, but there are an awful lot of garrison troops all over the Balkans, allowing a lot more German troops to be deployed in the Eastern War, which was going badly. So the last thing Hitler wanted was to actually have to occupy Italy with lots of troops he couldn't afford, probably against a

very hostile backdrop. But he couldn't leave it as a vacuum either, because it would be an easy win for the Allies. There'd be no resistance, Rome would fall, then they'd roll up the peninsula. So somehow he had to find Mussolini and he had to get Mussolini back alive and install him in a new fascist republic, which is eventually what he did. The problem was no one could find it for about between Lebas July the twenty sixth

and the beginning of September. There was some lead, some false, some good, but they didn't actually find out for sure what he was until the beginning of September nineteen forty three.

up as their command of army camp. And it's to say, look, you better get yourself on a plane. It's been trying to you know, I've been trying to reach you for hours. I don't know what you're doing, but you need to get on a plane straight away to the evolve Schanzer, which is Hitler's Layer, the Wolf's Layer in Eastern Prussia, because the Furer wants to see you. And you can

imagine the reaction he gets onto. He gets on the phone to his adjutant, so, god, I could have a clean set of clothes for this, but first of all, they'll have another drink. Drink is a big part of this. Anyway, he gets on the plane and it's one of these younger JU fifty two. It's very basic passenger plane actually, but it's got a VIP lounge. So he sort of amply fuels himself with more brandy on the way. This

three hour flight to Eastern Prussia lands. There is escorted in a black Mercedes car through all the defense and placements and he finally arrives at something towards the end of the day. If he arrives in something called the tea room, where is invited to wait for Adolf Hitler turn up, who, like most heads of state, never turns up early, and he gets a bit irritated with Hitler's it's not very wise, really, but then he's been drinking. Hitler's adjutant is a man called gun because this man

fails to pronounce his name correctly. His vein like that, it's Scott Sennie. I think Scott Sennie is most people, probably most Germans pronounced it when not educated, so Scott SENNI. Anyway, Eventually he finds himself he's hauled into a room with five others I think it is, and there are various special forces types, some from the maybe one from another off in SS unit, and so on and so forth. And into the room comes out of Hitler. Nothing's been explained,

and Hitler starts asking these strange questions. Scott Seene is at the bottom of the roe because he's the most tune. Yeah, he's only a captain. Some of them sort of majors and lieutenant colonels, and Hitler sort of starts asking them strange questions about Italy, and they come back with formulaic answers. They know there's a problem down there, but they don't know that Mussolini has been heisted.

That six a box for a start. It turns out, say you talk about this sort of the topography of Italy. But he said, you know the thing about me and Italy is I'm an Austrian. And Hitler pricks up his ear is because what's that really means is this is a coded message. It's going back to the Treaty of Versailles. Sandre Mao and Austria. Don't forget is Hitler, of course, just outside the point is himself an Austrian. Austria lost a lot of territory to in the Tarrol to Italy.

That's one of the bit was one of the victors.

And there's something like, I don't know, two hundred thousand Germans living in Italy and Deutsch bag Stutsch, yes, yes, essentially ethnic Germans, and Hitler had voiced his opinion on this in the past, but because of his close association with Selini, he hadn't wished to act, whereas he had acted in places like Romania, which I awful lot of Hungarians for example, and folk storage down there as well, which have been moved back into German areas of influence

within the Reich anyway, so that sort of seems to trigger something. We don't know exactly why Hitler chose Scott Seney, but basically he said, right, everyone else can go, you're the man for me, and then he explained everyone else went out of the room. Then he explained in a one to one to Scott Seeny exactly what was going on that he had to get. He was going to send Scott say out as his personal emissary, and they

had to get back Mussolinia or costs. And then he explained why now going on around this was a power play because the SS, this is Shellenberg and Colton Brann and of course Himmler, they were all at the Wolfshots.

Coincidentally enough, at this point they knew something big was going on, and they've just got their man embedded into a military operation while they were trying to do obviously it was highly important that they succeed, but they were trying to sort of take ownership, if you like, of the raid, because if they could rescue Mussolini, then it was one up against the for example, the conventional military Secret Service the otherwhere, which was much bigger, but in

the view of the SS, incompetantly run by Admiral Canaries. So there's a lot of competition behind the scenes, and they were gratified that their man, because they had no control over this, that actually won, if you like, the

beauty competition. So the next thing was to send him to he was He was put under the command of someone called Kurt Student, who was really the foremost airborne troops expert in the in the in the in the in the German Army or the German Luftwaf in fact uh and it sent nominally he was in the luflather. He was obliged to wear a lufflather uniform during the operation because strutting around an SS officer might send out the wrong signal to the Italians. They know something was

up and it wasn't very nice. So he's got this access to the leader of the expedition is acting as his adjutant. In fact, behind the scenes, Arto Scott Serny is able to tap into ousland SD the intelligence the foreign intelligence service of the SS, and it proves much more efficient than any of the other intelligence services which

are trying to establish the same thing. Where exactly has Mussolini been put At the beginning of September, just as things are really deteriorating on the warfront and Victor Emanuel Alton Badolio can't spit it out much longer, the Americans are losing patients and they declare that Italy has in fact surrendered, which is of course a trigger sign for the Germans to invade, because they don't want a vacuum go. The police attache attached to the German embassy in Rome.

It's called Herbert captain discovers exactly where he is, and he's upper mountain in the Brute Sea. It's in fact that a ski resort. It's about twenty two hundred meters up and the only way to get to it is apparently by a cable car, because that it still exists, actually that the nowadays as a road as well. In those days there's just a cable car from the nearest

village below, which is called a sergi. And so Scott Syne is able to take some of the credit for this because he's the one who's been scurrying around looking for information. He's been pushing it all the time. Student is a man who's quite worried by his other duties. He's not a political man at all. He lets Scott Sney do a lot of the talking at the Volva Schantzer because he's a much better presenter and somehow gives the impression that what Scott Saine is in charge, even

though he's not. And Scott Sayne has after all managed to be. He's the one of the bang on information thanks to his intelligence. So Scott Senne is students who is in Scott Sene's debt in a sense also he's very worried about this operation because it's wasting his time as a soldier. It's a political issue as far as he's concerned, and a minor one too, and he's got

nothing invested in Mussolini personally. What he's worried about is he knows that in a couple of days time is going to be involved in the most almighty fight with Italian forces over keeping Roman German hands. And that's exactly what happens. So there's a picture here building up as Scott Sainny is able to move into a vacuum you like. But the question now and claim some of the credit. The question now is how he actually going to get hold of their man. And it's pretty obvious that, well,

there are three ways of doing it. There's a ground attack and then two forms of airborne attack. You can send in paratroopers, you know, parachuters, or you can send them in by glider. Paratroopers by glider. And the problem with parachuters list to dismiss this straight away is it had never been done at that kind of altitude. They'd be blown all over the place. There's no accuracy. Glider's pretty dangerous too, especially if we didn't set our first

thing in the morning because of the thermals. But anyway, Scott saying, he was later to claim that he'd foreseen all this, and you know, the only way to do it was a combined operation. A ground force would attack a searcher, overpower the carabinari guards at the bostom take command of the cable car. But while they were doing this, a glider force of about one hundred men, ten gliders it turned out originally twelve, would land on the mountain

and storm this hotel and rescue Missolini. Then they joined forces. Now there's a huge amount of controversy after the war, I say, rather than during it, because with Hitler around, no one want to argue about who gets first DIBs the laurels for the the for what turned out to be a dangerous but very successful mission. Scott's Sony Wow he he he claimed later on to have been actually involved in the planning of the This is absolutely he had no knowledge of airborne tactics at that time at all.

He'd been in an infantry soldier effectively, it was someone called Major Moor's. He had a lot of experience, he'd been involved in There's a famous Commando Raident a fortress called evan Emil in the opening stages of the German invasion drum in nineteen forty, which was masterminded. It took

about six months actually to masterminded planning for it. It was sort of prototype of its kind that had been done with gliders, and there was a similar operation in crete less successful, but the Germans did prevail in nineteen forty one, and he'd been involved in both of these. He'd also carried out similar operations in the Soviet Union, immensely experienced. But his problem was that he had a

dodgy political record. He'd let it be known. It was either defeat his talk or he wasn't too keen on an artsist, so he wasn't the obvious hero everyone was looking for. Neverthless, he did all the groundwork on it, and he decided the operation it was more sound in to lead the ground force, which was actually bigger, about two hundred and fifty men in armored trucks and so on up to a surgery. This left Scort saying an interesting position. He wangled his way, persuaded Student to let

him go with the glider force. They're about fifteen ss men actually, originally fifty brought in in the operation, only fifteen participate in the actual glider landing. Most of the people and the gliders were Lufaffe Assort paratroopers and a way it was supposed to pan out, and students said this afterwards in his memoirs, you know, essentially Scott saying his view was just a sort of police escort he was.

He was there to sort of take charge once the Lufafer Hood, shall we say, relieved Massoline, relieve the Italians of Massolini, was supposed to take him back to Berlin. But that was about it really, But it didn't work out like that because what happened was that the ten gliders which finally turned up from southern France that day, they were late, late, taking off about one o'clock I believe,

which made it even more of a dangerous expedition. Well, problem morale probably wasn't helped by our so called PEP taught a student gave and you just gave it from the shoulder, and he said, look, you know, there are going to be a lot of casualties in this eighty percent casualties. Nothing like this has been tried before. They had almost no time to put this together. That's the way. That's the that's what the funeral wants. That's the way

it's going to be. So off you go. While they were going, the German glider tactics involved, and this is quite important in the gliders in strings of three and the first three had the supposedly the commander of the father ground troops. The paratroopers are commanded by someone called bailepch On bare Lips was a lieutenant. And in the number four that is the beginning of the next what

were called Ketty. The next triad of gliders the Scot Siny with this Italian general that he captured because they thought it would be a good bit of substitution. Come to that in a minute. And then the glider behind him was Carl Radley's adjutant and lots of other SS paratroopers. Where they went really paratroopers, there were simply troops who knew so much about flying in gliders that they actually had a hearty breakfast beforehand with more results. They were

that inexperienced and amateuris in a way. So anyway, what's happened is that Scott Senny, in part of his intelligence gathering, no one actually knew what they was going to confront them when they got to you know, two thousand, two hundred feet what exactly were they landing on. Scott Sney had been up in a Hinkel bomber earlier on and he'd done some intelligence work. The uh look farther intelligence officer had fallen out with him because the stereoscopic camera

in the plane had failed. This would have given high resolution photographs of the landing ground. It failed. So this guy Langut, whose name was, said, well, let's return, maybe mission on accomplished. Were just going to manage somehow. But a Scotsne insisted in taking pictures with a less sophisticated camera in very difficult conditions, and he got something which was developed and it was a bit like you know,

picture of lunar craters or something. It was very interestinct, about four inches by four inches when they developed it. But this was the only plan they had of a landing zone. As Scotsene thought it might be a sort of gentle ski slope. It's nothing that sort of. It's very rocky anyway. What happens is that as the glyders are climbing and going towards their target, the first three, containing the most important elements of loof off the force are forced to turn and re enter the glider path

because they haven't gained enough height. Over there are sort of hills around Tillerley, and so the second group of three, that's number four glider containing Scorseenne, are now in the lead. So by a chart once my happenstance, Scott Sney is the first to land in his glider and they actually

land quite well. I mean that that there's some discussion as to how much influence Scott Sainey had over the landing, whether you could actually talk to the pilot through the partition, But anyway, it was said later in general staff reports that Scott Sney had bulleted the pilot, making him make a crash landing, but he was actually specifically told not to. They landed without too much damage anyway, and they you

know that, the SS troopers get out very shaken. They there, they've been airsick and so on, stumble around not having a clue what they're doing really. Then the second the second rider lands and the commander in there, the sy commander, and that manages to break his leg. So it's all a bit kick down a door at the side of the of the of the Hope tell but it's not actually an entry to the hotel at all. It's it's a dead end and it's just got a radio operate

to it. So it's got Sonny gets out his lugo or whatever sort of smashes the radio and then they're looking for Mussolinia. They go bound round the back. There's still no one else in sight, none of the other gliders have turned up yet. And then he has his charts, he sees his chance. He comes around the back out to the front and there's there's Mussolini peering out of the first floor windows saying I'm I'm here, I'm here,

you know. And that's it, really without more ado. Just as the other gliders are landing, these people who should actually being taken command of the operation, Scott sny Is makes a sort of heroic dash to the doors. He doesn't meet any resistance up to the first floor room where Musline is being held, and basically takes over. He does it by bluff. He has said to his troops the safety catch is on noquiring. We've got to do this by stealth, and that's what.

sealed up, you know. Burleps arrives about that time and secures the perimeters of the hotel and so on and so forth. They disarm all the Italian guards through about one hundred and twenty of them. I mean, any you have to say that it was insanely brave of Scott's Senny. He was very lucky too, but he could have been shot at any time. It technically Italy was now in a state of war with Germany, so.

in terms of its historical significance. It didn't change the outcome of the Second wor world, of course, but it did slightly change its course because what could have happened, as I said earlier, was that the Allies could have occupied a vacuum that the if the King and Badoglio had had their way and there's been a show you know, Maussoleon had been passed over the bit of show trial.

I think the Allies might have been grateful enough and they'd opened their doors fully before the Germans could occupy the country. The war in Italy might have been very different to what it was taken two years, but.

we say, student's commitment to get Mussolini out. And of course he was the one who when the film cameras came out, because the even on a dangerous mission like this, they had a commando company propaganda unit with them. There was a journalist and a cameraman and so on and so forth coming up from from from below. So he was on film and this made him look like a superhero, all right.

to remember. So he got his ritt Across, which was a coming of age for him, and then he didn't really have to he really didn't have to look back. I mean, Hitler wanted to give him. Anything happened whenever Hitler had a problem, something that needed to be shut down. These other operations, he referred to Scott saying he was often the man first chosen to accomplish the task.

and he spends two years in jail. Well, some of his compatriots didn't make it. He made it through. So you know, Ernst Coltenberg got hong or shot. I don't know what happened to him, but one of his solow auctions, but for some reason he speeds through.

the beginning of the German campaign Hitler's last throw. Really there is a company of German commanders dressed as US, armed as US servicemen, with US documents, authentic fakes if you like, driving US dreams, and they power behind the American lines with the Panzas behind them, and the idea is to sew a lot of discord among the Americans, which they actually succeeded in doing. It's complicated and in some ways a rather distressing story because a lot of

them got killed. But it was a clever ploy and Scott Saeny and his officers made sure they it's impossible to keep a secret operation of that size completely off the books. Rumors were going to get out, they might get through to Allied intelligence. So what they quite cleverly did was they allowed the rumors to multiply up on the objective of this. This this it was called Panza Brigade one point fifty, which involved fate Allied weapons converted Panzas.

There were some genuine captured stuff, but it's very difficult to get at that stage of the war, which Germany had been losing for quite some time, it's very difficult to haul back the right kind of materiel. So the Germans sort of built their own really painted a few German Ford trucks and American colors. That sort of thing turned German tanks into what looked like Shermans and so

on and so forth. And the idea behind it was that the the jeep company, where supposedly everyone on board spoke fluent English, with an American accident far from the case in fact, would go and so discord behind the American lines. The idea was that the Germans had to get from their border in the Eiffel Forest quite near Cologne, to the Merz Bridges. The tanks force anyway had to get there within four days and then they would go

as far as Antwerp in seven days. They cut off the twenty first British Army and a large part of the American Army up there, and it'd be another Dunkirk. That's what Hitler thought. It was crazy, but that's what he thought, I mean. And they would capture munitions and petrol dunce, which is very important because tanks crawl along, you know, they can consume a massive amount of petrol and diesel. So they needed to act by that time

of the war. They needed to capture stuff as they went along, and so Scott Sainne was in charge of this fast mechanized force. But the interesting part of it was really the command of company of jeeps. Some of them got captured and they were full of all these rumors,

but they didn't know which ones were correct. Among them was this idea that the real purpose of the operation was, yes, a breakthrough, but Scottsany and his commanders were going to jeep their way to Paris under the guys of being American soldiers, and then they were going to kidnap the SuperM Alle command and general. Yeah, this was something that was not forgotten and not appreciated because it made an

idiot of the American security detail. Eisenhower's pinned down for over a week from the middle of December on was just when he should have been directing operations in the Battle of the Bulge. But nevertheless, they didn't forget it, and at payback time came somewhat later. Scottsaney eventually surrenders around about sixteenth May nineteen forty five. That's dead, he's in the Austrian mountains, but he realizes a gorilla war

was going to be hopeless. The Americans they make some mistakes with them actually, because obviously, as you were see from now by now, he's a very mediogenic, charismatic kind of person, and they it's a high profile arrest in which she's not exactly beaten up, but he's brutalized a bit, and there are the media's around slash Bob Pop, so he's sort of turned himself into a bit of a martyr already, and then comes his trial about two years later.

This is not unusual, by the way, The Allies spent quite a long time, especially Americans, who was slow but patient, spent quite a long time interrogating suspect officers. Most officers, including wehrmarket officers, non often officers, spent time in jail, but most hadn't committed verifiable war crimes. The question was, had scored Seney committed a war crime? And the answer is technically maybe, because what he'd done with his jeep

commando unit was he'd broken something. It's a very strange thing because the war in the East was fought absolutely brutally without any rules, including dressing up in each other's uniforms all the time, firing on each other while in these uniforms, Russia didn't adhere to the Geneva Convention. For example, in the West, it was fought in a form as

more gentle and main manner. Of course there were atrocities, of course there were, but the German generals as well as the Allied ones, liked to fight by the book. And the book was something called the nineteen oh seven Hay Convention, and in it was this article twenty three, which said basically that you know, okay, ruses, what we would call false flag operations today, ruses camouflage operations were allowed in war. But here's the absurdity of it. You

had to effecting a more chivalrous age. I think when you engage the enemy, you had to rip off your false uniform to a display who you were, and only then could you fire at them. And the question was, had these Commando Company troops in their jeeps had there at any time actually fired on the Americans without alerting them, because if so, they could be technically arrested as spies and shot. And that's what happened to him. Fifteen of them the.

time eighty five was due. This was during a push some days into the operation which at one time looked if it might be quite successful. And there's no rhyme or reason why this massacre happened. The American unit was disarmed and some Buffaness troops. We don't notice this day exactly who was responsible, but the army command, led by Yoku and Piper, was very sort of dynamic of ruthless.

Tank commander was held responsible because they'd issued orders sort of say take no prisoners basically in some ofthing SS soldiers had taken it seriously. The question was was Scott Sainey, who was sort of in the area at the time, but not in the area. Was he also responsible had he also issued similar orders say no prisoners to shoot them regardless of who they are, as they have some asset about looking for information. And actually, I mean when I went through the detail of it, it was clear

in fact that this was a put up job. That Scott Sainey had absolutely nothing to do with the Malmadi massacre. He was nohea at the time. There was one reconnaissance cheap that was that happened in the area of Malmady by mistake about three hour hours after their massive happened on the seventeenth December I think it was nineteen forty four. What was going on was it was payback time. Really

from Rosenfeld's point of view. These court martials, they were administered as the name suggests, under military or not civil law. You could do all sorts of things. You could if you were rosenfeldt anyway you could. You could stage manage the evidence, you could beat evidence if you like, out of prisoners because no one's going to stop you, you know, good,

and beat them, starve them, all sorts of things. Obviously you couldn't to get the kind of outcome you wanted, because in the court from the court was made up largely of these sort of field colonel lieutenant colonel types, we weren't actually lawyers at all. Rosenvelt was a professional lawyer, so he knew what he wanted, and he couldn't get Scott Sane in on the mal made trial the previous year because he was actually ill. He had another bout of collitus and he had to have his gall bladder

operated on at the time. So this is payback time. So that's why the charge was appended. There's another technical reason why Rosenfeld did it, but I won't go into that now. Uh, that was the biggest thing held against him. Initially, because there was no witness who turned up in time, the charge had to be dropped. But the issue of whether Scott saying his Commando company troops had fired without warning while an American uniform stuck for a lot longer.

But eventually he had a very good lawyer called Robert D. Durst, who's from Missari, I think a Springfield Massari, and he was backed up by someone who actually did have experience of criminal trials, a criminal trial lawyer, lawyer. I think

he'd been in the DA's office in San Francisco. Someone called Donald McClure a good team, and they learned from them as takes of the previous trial, where basically people have been able to proffer their own defenses, and what happened was that, you know, all the German lawyers suggested a cutthroat defense, so everyone blamed everyone else and everyone or the defendants went down. Some were condemned to death, although that was reprieved some you know, as little as

ten years. So this was not a good outcome. And Deurst could see that the way to get through this trial was to impose a single narrative on what actually happened and choose a leader, and Scott Seney was the obvious leader. There were ten defendants altogether in this trial, so he was selected as their spokesman. Say it had quite a harrying time being cross examined, and he seems to have performed quite well under pressure, but he was sort of stage managed by Dost and what Dewist did,

and this was almost an accident, but not quite. He realized that you couldn't really get away with this charge that easily, but you could almost fit by pointing out if you can find the evidence that the Allies had done just the same thing, you know, in nineteen oh seven conventions that was put together at a time when there weren't tanks, airplanes or indeed really commandos in the modern sets that were and you know, it was out of date, and the British and Americans had done similar things.

Hitler was convinced this was the justification for Scortsinny's type of undercover operation in the first place, that the Americans had done just the same at Arkham, which was the first city in Germany to fall in September I think it was nineteen forty four. In fact, there was an OSS unit had cloaked itself in German uniform and shot her from German machine gun posts. It subsequently emerged, so

there was some justification. So what dust the defense lawyer did was he found this man called Tommy Yo Thomas, Wing commander Tommy Tommy Thomas, who was a war hero, a British war hero, who had assisted in an operation called ACM top Ta nineteen forty four. But the idea was to where German uniforms, they're actually SD uniforms, not military ones. It didn't matter the operation didn't come off.

It was a bit theoretical, but basically in the witness box, you Thomas was very sympathetic to scorts in his position, and when asked by the defense accounts of what he had done if the operation had gone ahead and they've been challenged by German centuries, so they were trying to rescue a leading member of the French resistance in Rent, he said, well, we would have bumped them off, no question. We'd have just shot them and disappeared with our prisoner.

So that it wasn't very good lead. You know, as a legal argument, it didn't hold up very well, but it made a huge impression on the judges and everyone. There were other aspect trial, of course, but everyone that he was Unit. All the defendants were.

I Mean, he double's Disciple I think is fitting. Not really, you know, he wasn't a saint for by any stretch of the imagination, but the fact that he skirted out of so many predicaments is really something. Else Where's the best place for people to get this book? Auto score Skinny The Devil's Disciple.